When glazing, I often dip one glaze over another to get the results I want. Some turn out beautifully and become main studio glaze and others, not so good. I have had anything from swamp scum brown, to burn scar pink/yellow, to simply running off the pot and destroying shelves. Much like Christmas morning, you are never really sure of what you will get when combining glazes.
I had my last Tuesday night Clay Class a few weeks ago. It has been a busy time, and keep in mind I am so unorganized. I was running fairly fast for me. I had the trade show looming, pot orders to get out and working at the Post Office. When I set up the studio for glazing, grabbed the wrong bucket for the ladies to dip first and then second to get my Moonshadow glaze.
It’s a small studio, 600 square feet. I use 32 gallon garbage cans for glaze buckets and I had out six large buckets and three, 5 gallon pails for glazing. There are 7 ladies in the class all glazing at once. In the mix, I put the wrong bucket out. All the ladies used it thinking they were getting Moonshadow. The glazing class is fun and a little crazy.
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It wasn’t until the next day, I discovered that we used the wrong bucket. All the ladies that wanted Moonshadow had glazed it wrong. I had no idea what the glaze would be. I had a good idea it would be in brown family, but what brown? Swamp scum brown, snot green? I was fairly sure it wouldn’t run off the pot, both glazes were the same base so they would work together, but to do what? I told the ladies it was wrong and asked if they wanted to come back, wash it all off and reglaze. In my mind I was saying ” no, no no” I had no time for another class. As it turned out, neither did they. They/ we decided to let it go and see what we would get…..what could happen…… What happened was beautiful. I am so happy to add “Sage Brush” to my line of glazes.
This is the first text I did. We took it out and put in a sage brush, just for fun. You can see where it got its name.
Then I applied it to more pots to get a better idea, and it is a keeper!
There are no mistakes. I thought I really goofed up and ruined everything. This is the result. It’s my new glaze, Sage Brush. It is the colour of the local sage brush. I would like to say that have been working all this time to formulate a glaze that represents the area and our new home…..
I guess I could say that….. Yeah… that’s it…..The new glaze is the result of two years of study and represents where we live and the impact the local environment has on my work………Yeah…..
Give me a bit more time and I will work that into an artist statement. ……Maybe not.
Until next time.
